D200 - Second Time's A Charm
Nikon's second attempt at a small semi-pro DSLR was a much greater success! Unlike the D100 this model is a unique and full metal chassis with great ergonomics and performance for a much lower price (£1,299 / $1,699). Twenty years on, people are still digging them up to play with its CCD sensor, and in my opinion it would make a great budget platform to learn on today.
Red Squirrel + Nikon D200 + Nikkor 85mm f/1.4 D
Key Specifiations
Sensor:
Resolution:
Burst:
DR Stops:
E-Shutter:
SS:
AF points:
Video:
Live View:
ISO:
OVF:
LCD:
Memory:
Weight:
Battery:
APS-C CCD
10mp
5fps / 21 shots
7.8 (12bit)
1/250th
30s - 1/8,000th
11 (10%)
No
No
100 - 1,600
0.94x / 95%
2.5" / 230k / Fixed
CF
920g
~500 (EN-EL3e)
The D100 was Nikon's attempt to try and make a small digital SLR for under $2000. That might not seem too difficult today, but only two years earlier they already pulled off a miracle getting the pro D1 as small and as cheap as it was ($5000). The D100 cut way too many corners to manage this. Borrowing much of its design from the F80 and being predominantly plastic, it really didn't live up to the assumed pedigree of the F100. If only they didn't call it D100, maybe they would have got away with it. The D200, however, fixed all of these issues and more. Nikon was back!
Red Squirrel | Nikkor 85mm | f/1.4 | iso200
Retro Revival
In 2006, I remember the D200 being a very exciting body upgrade, even coming from the pro level D2H. Today, most of the interest comes from its 10 megapixel CCD sensor. I have to admit that it was this pushing me over the edge to buy the camera again in 2025, but now that I have it, I am remembering just how premium this camera feels to use. Many retro digital cameras that I have returned to require quite an adjustment to enjoy shooting with today, but with the D200 I can easily forget that it's even old at all, other than it's a bit heavy. I picked up this D200 for €75, and it's in mostly great condition. With a couple of carefully chosen lenses, this could make a great budget system to learn photography fundamentals. Yes the sensor is a bit old and noisy by today's standards, but if you in any way have a nerdy interest in the CCD colours, I highly recommend giving this model strong consideration.
Amsterdam | Nikkor 17-55mm | f/5.6 | so100
Evolution
When the Nikon D100 came out in 2002, the name suggested a digital version of the Nikon F100 (film camera), and that generated a lot of excitement. Unfortunately, photographer's experience of the overwhelmingly plastic chassis and heavy re-use of F80 components was rather disappointing. Fast-forward three years, however, and not only had the buttons, screen and OVF been vastly improved, but the chassis gained a high-end full magnesium skeleton that even surpassed the F100.
Sensor
The CCD colours are something that I was highly sceptical about until last year when I tried photographing red squirrels in the summer. The strong green cast from all the foliage easily washed out the red fur colour in the squirrels when using modern CMOS sensors, but with CCD the colours felt much closer to reality. Try as I might to replicate this with image processing on the CMOS images, I could not get the results to a similar point. Granted, it's a bit of a niche subject, but that just happened to be what I like to shoot. You might be able to find other situations where the colours look better. Many others love this look too.
Yetminster | Nikkor 17-55mm | f/7.1 | so100
Ergonomics
Buttons are very well positioned even on the oldest Nikon DSLRs, but this feels like a noticeable refinement that steers the experience to a much more pro level. I really like the design and mechanism of the card door latch, the d-pad lock, focus mode selector and the drive mode dial. They're really nice to interact with and everything feels natural.
Road Trip | Nikkor 17-55mm | f/8 | iso100
Image Quality
The camera's 10mp CCD sensor was a nice bump up from Nikon's earlier 6mp DSLRs, although it is more noisy too. You could get a 12mp sensor if you had £3500 ($5000) to spend on a pro body, although now those are less appealing due to them switching to CMOS. This CCD sensor was the last one that Nikon made, although they did also put it in the cheaper D80 body a year later. For me, coming from the 4mp JFET-LBCAST sensor in the Nikon D2H, it was a good boost in potential sharpness. The worst element about using the D200 today is probably the crop factor (sensor size), but unfortunately there is only one full frame CCD sensor (Leica M9).
Amsterdam | Nikkor 17-55mm | f/8 | so100 | HDR
Speed
Burst speed is a very reasonable 5fps for a higher resolution sensor (for the time), matching the D2X due to using the same processing. The slightly lower resolution enabled the buffer to fit 21 raw shots at max burst, compared to just 15 on the D2X. Both the D2X and D200 were the first Nikon DSLRs to use 100 as a base iso sensitivity instead of 200 (they would return to 200 for the first full frame models before dropping again). Maximum shutter speeds are a decent 1/8000th here, instead of the disappointing 1/4000th from the D100, thankfully. That was also the case with the D70/s, but that was likely due to the CCD sensor more than the shutter itself.
Amsterdam | Nikkor 17-55mm | f/8 | so100 | HDR
My obsession with bokeh panoramas didn't start until after owning the Nikon D200. I will try to update this review with some samples of that technique soon. One thing that I did experiment with while owning the D200 in 2006 was HDR. The camera could bracket up to 9 exposures, so that's what I did. The sample below was one I took in Amsterdam back in 2006
Conclusion
The Nikon D200 was a great camera in 2005 given its price. I would much rather have this camera over the much more expensive D2X, and that's without considering the D200's awesome CCD sensor. For the price you can pick it up for today, it's still a very interesting camera. The CCD sensor produces some beautiful images with fun colours that may not be considered accurate by today's standards, but in several situations they do look better.